


Avengers in Babysitting

by Ultra



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Accidental Baby Acquisition, Adventure, Awkwardness, Babysitting, Bonding, Child Abandonment, Children, Confusion, Cute Kids, Developing Friendships, Developing Relationship, Drama, Established Relationship, F/M, False Accusations, Feelings, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Happy Ending, Help, Humor, Implied Relationships, Mystery, One Big Happy Family, Relationship(s), Research, Team, Team Dynamics, Team as Family, Teamwork, Undecided Relationship(s), Warm and Fuzzy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-03
Updated: 2014-11-03
Packaged: 2018-02-23 19:51:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2553485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ultra/pseuds/Ultra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <img/>
</p><p> </p><p>Following the Battle of New York, Darcy Lewis is interning at Stark Tower, where all the of Avengers now live. When a mysterious package arrives for Tony, it's Darcy who must deliver it to the latest Avengers meeting in the conference room. Is it a bomb? A gift? A trophy? An AC/DC record? None of the above - it's a baby. Now the Avengers must face their scariest challenge yet - baby-sitting a six month old! Pepper is blaming Tony, Clint is looking to a future with Natasha, Steve and Thor are thinking about their respective past and future relationships, and Darcy is setting her sights on the softer side of Bruce. All this before they even discover that this isn't any ordinary child they're taking care of...</p><p>Written for <a href="http://marvel-bang.livejournal.com/profile">Marvel Bang 2014</a> at Livejournal.</p><p>Art created by the wonderful <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/SlytherinGurrl/pseuds/SlytherinGurrl">SlytherinGurrl</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Something you want to tell us, Tony?” asked Pepper, arms folded, foot tapping.

In all fairness, Stark did look completely baffled by the turn of events.

“Why is this automatically all about me?” he checked, looking around the assembled group. “I mean, yeah, I know, most things usually are, but this?”

He shook his head in the negative even as most people continued to stare.

“Do not dare to look in my direction!” said Thor, when some gazes seemed to drift his way.

“Or mine,” confirmed Bruce, backing up a step out of anyone’s eyeline.

“No!” Steve Rogers shook his head violently when he seemed to be next to get the attention, and Clint was quick to give a similar response.

“Well, a baby didn’t make itself, boys,” said Natasha definitely, looking at each of them in turn.

In response, the kid in the centre of the conference table giggled and stuck out his tongue. He didn’t seem worried in the slightest that nobody would claim him. As little as he was, it was unlikely he had a clue what was truly going on right now. In that at least, he was not alone.

_Thirty minutes earlier_

Darcy Lewis didn’t mind the fetching and carrying of things. She had gotten used to it recently and quite honestly it was nice to spend her time on simple tasks while she had the chance. God-like aliens from other planets, giant robots, space invaders, all of these things were super cool in their own way, but it made a person appreciate the little things in life, the things that human beings could actually control, like collecting the mail and fetching coffees for heroes. Okay, so maybe that second one wasn’t exactly the norm, but Darcy knew as much as she would prefer her own life to be a little on the simpler side sometimes, it was kind of nice to be adventure adjacent too! It was why she had leapt at the chance to be an intern at Stark Industries for a while.

Jane was still holed up somewhere safe where S.H.I.E.L.D. could protect her, but Darcy was going stir crazy trapped there with her friend and colleague. When word came that the Battle of New York had changed the world, that there was now a team called The Avengers all living at Stark Tower for the foreseeable, Darcy had longed to come see what was going on. Her wish was granted thanks to Thor’s glowing recommedation, that and Tony Stark’s inability to resist another young woman to work closely with and tell his hero tales too.

So, here they were all living in the upper part of the tower - Tony of Iron Man fame and his girl Friday, Pepper Potts; Thor Odinson of Asgard; Steve Rogers alias Captain America; the elusive Dr Bruce Banner, rumoured to also be big, green, and Hulk when he got angry; plus a couple of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents named Barton and Romanoff, handy with a bow and arrow, and fists and feet respectively. It was quite the set of people to come and join, and yes, Darcy Lewis did feel a little small stood next to them all, but what she didn’t have in height or in super-powers, Darcy made up for in personality, that was for sure, at least she always thought so.

“Seriously, guys?” she yelled as the main door swung closed in her face.

It wouldn’t usually be much of a problem, but when a persons hands were full with a serious amount of coffee and assorted pastries, it posed a bit of a problem.

“My apologies, Ms Lewis,” the doorman said quickly yanking open the door for her.

“Don’t sweat it, Jeeves,” she muttered as she came into the building as awkwardly as she had ever done anything. “It’s not like it matters if my nose gets flattened by glass, right?”

“Miss Lewis?” said another voice, one she knew well and smiled at the sound of. “A delivery has just been made for Mr Stark. He asked if you might bring it up with you?”

“Oh, right. Sure thing, J.A.R.V.I.S.,” she rolled her eyes. “Exactly where on my person would Tony like me to put his package, huh?”

That comment got a few choice looks and sniggers from the other people milling around the foyer. Darcy bit her lip.

“Yeah, don’t answer that.”

“As you wish, Miss Lewis. Might I suggest the use of a mail cart for all your items to be carried?” J.A.R.V.I.S. suggested. “There is one located in the south corridor outside of the storage room, and then you will be approximately four point five metres from the elevator.”

“Good to know you got my back, J.A.R.V.I.S. Thanks,” said Darcy as she followed his suggested route.

She put the coffee and snacks onto the cart and then ran back to Reception for the parcel that had apparently been dropped off for Tony. It was heavier than she expected but she managed to carry it without too much struggle. Carefully she placed it in the lower part of the cart and then got into the elevator.

She had ridden the first twenty floors before she heard the noise. It was a strange sound, like a scratching and a murmuring mixed together. Darcy frowned and turned a full circle in the small space. There was definitely nobody and nothing present here except her and the contents of the mail cart. Leaning down she put her ear to the package with Tony’s name on it. 

“Oh, damn!” she cursed, willing the elevator to go faster - it didn’t.

At the height of her panic, Darcy was glad to see the doors were suddenly open and she quickly wheeled the cart out into the hallway. As fast as she dared to go, the intern rushed to the conference room and shoved her way inside.

All eyes were immediately on the intrusion, even though they must have known it could only be one person. The fact she was even on this floor proved it had to be Darcy, since everyone else was already present and accounted for.

“There’s something in the box!” she announced. “Something ticking or scratching. Basically, a bomb or a creature,” she explained quickly.

The group of superheroes and associates around the table all got up simultaneously, staring down at the bottom shelf of the mail cart Darcy had pushed away from herself. Her back was currently flat against the opposite wall with the muscle of Thor quite literally between her and any possible danger. It wasn’t that the other guys hadn’t earned her respect and all, but Thor was her buddy and akin to a god in his strength and invicibility. Whatever was in that box, she figured he could deal with it.

“Whatever danger we might face, is it not better to see it’s identity?” he questioned.

Steve held up a hand to encourage Thor to take a step back again.

“How do we know that when we open the box it won’t explode or worse?”

In any normal situation, somebody might have asked if there was anything worse than an explosion. All those assembled in this room knew much better, unfortunately.

“Whatever it is, I doubt it’s going to cause me any damage,” said Bruce, deciding to step up already.

He moved past Rogers and Romanoff, crouching down to the height of the mystery package. Lifting it up in his hands, he felt something shift and heard a sort of a whimpering sound. If he didn’t knew better, he’d think there was something alive in that box. He said as much as he placed it on the table and cautiously began to prise the flimsy packaging away. An audible gasp went around the room when they saw what, or rather who, was inside.

“Oh my God!” Pepper gasped, watching the small child wriggle and writhe. “Who would do this? Send a baby in the mail?” she asked in disgust.

“It used to be legal,” Steve said aloud, immediately wishing he hadn’t when everyone gave him a joint strange look. “I never did it, I just know it used to be legal,” he confirmed.

All attention soon went back to the baby as it whimpered some, apparently not very happy. It was unsurprising if it had been in the box for any length of time. Romanoff surmised that it wasn’t so very long when she reached in to grab a piece of folded paper from beside the child and found the ink smudged onto her fingers. This had been done quickly, last minute.

“Mr Stark,” she read aloud. “I need to know my son is safe, so I’m sending him to you, to the home of the heroes who saved New York. Please, save him too. None of this is his fault.”

“Something you want to tell us, Tony?” asked Pepper, arms folded, foot tapping.

In all fairness, Stark did look completely baffled by the turn of events.

“Why is this automatically all about me?” he checked, looking around the assembled group. “I mean, yeah, I know, most things usually are, but this?”

He shook his head in the negative even as most people continued to stare.

“Do not dare to look in my direction,” said Thor, when some gazes seemed to drift his way.

“Or mine,” confirmed Bruce, backing up a step out of anyone’s eyeline.

“No!” Steve Rogers shook his head violently when he seemed to be next to get the attention, and Clint was quick to give a similar response.

“Well, a baby didn’t make itself, boys,” said Natasha definitely, looking at each of them in turn.

In response the kid in the centre of the conference table giggled and stuck out his tongue. He didn’t seem worried in the slightest that nobody would claim him. As little as he was, it was unlikely he had a clue what was truly going on right now. In that at least, he was not alone.

“Regardless of who fathered the child, he needs taking care of,” said Steve sensibly, peering cautiously at the baby. “Surely we need to call the authorities.”

“I would usually agree,” considered Pepper. “But honestly, if he’s been sent here in these extreme circumstances... How do we know there isn’t a legimiate reason why the mother couldn’t go through the usual channels?”

It gave them all something to think about. There were certainly a great number of circumstances under which a parent would not want their child put into the system. Maybe just because they had experience of that way of life and didn’t want it for their baby. The Avengers seemed like a better option somehow, and yet each and every person stood in this room wondered at it. Not one amongst them had any real experience of raising a baby and were not entirely the type of people you would think of for babysitting duties. They had everyone here from a big green monster to an alien to secret agents known more for inflicting pain than being loving and nurturing. Still, if the child really did need protection in some way, it was probably their responsibility to give it.

“If the child has been entrusted to our care then we must vow to protect him.”

Thor voiced an opinion they were all sharing it seemed. Natasha looked to Clint but didn’t let a hint of emotion show. She knew what this was doing to him, but she wouldn’t say a word in front of the others.

“Until we know exactly where he came from, I doubt it’s a smart move to just hand him over to child services. Who knows who or what he could be?”

“She has a point,” Tony considered, as the baby wriggled on the table top and then suddenly went for a roll.

More than one pair of hands instinctively reached out to catch him, but there was no need. The child landed on his stomach, looked momentarily shocked by his own achievement, and then burst into fits of happy giggles. Even this group of world-weary hardened heroes couldn’t help but laugh too.


	2. Chapter 2

There was an eerie silence around the conference table, and Darcy wasn’t altogether happy with being the centre of attention. When it became apparent that the baby she had brought in was staying, it was clear somebody needed to get the kid off the table. None of the hero types looked especially comfortable with that prospect, so Darcy took point. She wasn’t half so scared of the little guy now she knew he was a person and all, or at least seemed to be human. The whimpering parcel had been creepy, but the kid was adorable, and Darcy knew what she was doing, for the most part anyway. She had cousins she had helped take care of and the neighbours kids sometimes. Baby’s weren’t so tough, not in small doses anyway.

Darcy had been offered a seat between Thor and Dr Banner, her friend the Asgardian pulling the chair out for her like a gentleman. The Hulk’s alter-ego looked much more uncomfortable about being in the next seat over. Darcy suspected that was way more to do with the baby than her. He was the shy type, which was crazy when one considered what The Other Guy was like. Maybe he was just wary of scaring the baby, though Darcy truly couldn’t see it happening.

“You’re a good kid, junior,” she said to the child who happily sat in her lap, gurgling away, trying to put her security pass lanyard into his mouth. “I’ll bet you’re not always this quiet though,” she smiled at him.

Tony had a lot of images up on the holoscreen over the table but didn’t seem to be sharing yet. Darcy deliberately had the baby facing her and not the bright lights, she wasn’t sure if it would be good for the kid. Besides, there was every chance he would want to get back on the table and mess with things and that would be no good.

There was a whispered conversation going on between Stark and Potts, but nobody was even trying to listen in. All eyes seemed to be on Darcy and the nameless baby in her lap. That made her a little wary, but she didn’t mind too much. She knew Tony would be commanding attention again before long, because that was just the way it was with this team.

“Okay,” he said right in that moment. “So, we’ve looked into the camera feeds around both the mail room and the lobby,” he explained, spinning the holo-display so everybody else could see the images it made. “The package was delivered to the front desk by a supposed courier service, but so far we’re having trouble figuring out exactly who it was.”

“Certainly the packaging didn’t have a return address,” Pepper said needlessly. “J.A.R.V.I.S., do you have anymore information than we’re getting from the cameras?” she checked, speaking towards the ceiling.

“The message from the front desk to Mr Stark is time-stamped 09.52,” answered the polite English voice. “The only footage of a possible delivery driver is what you already have in front of you. There is a chance that the cameras on the outside of the building would have picked up something useful, if any of them were currently operational.”

Tony winced at the sound of those words. Of course, most of his security systems were still being repaired. It was almost a month since the Battle of New York, but there had just been so much damage, even all his money and power couldn’t get everything fixed immediately. The cameras on the outside of Stark Tower were still dummies, which was enough of a deterrent to keep most people out, especially when those living within the tower were as much a warning as a temptation! That meant they had precisely squat to go on.

“So, here’s what we have,” said Tony, enlarging the image of the delivery man as much as the holo-screen would allow. “One fuzzy image of a delivery guy in a baseball cap, one empty box with a smudgy note in it,” he said holding up the evidence. “And... a baby.”

“An adorable baby,” Darcy amended, chuckling at the kid in her arms who was clapping intermittently, missing as many times as he made contact, but nevertheless enjoying himself.

Bruce laughed too just watching the happy little bundle. The deeper sound of male laughter caught the child’s attention and he looked sideways at the man beside Darcy. Staring for a long moment, he then started to wriggle and reach out his pudgy little arms to the doctor.

“Oh, you wanna go see Uncle Bruce now?” asked Darcy, lifting the baby clear of her lap and holding him out to the guy beside her.

“No, I don’t think...” he tried to protest, but Darcy didn’t want to hear it. “Okay,” he relented, having little choice in the matter when the baby was dumped unceremoniously into his lap.

“Go with it, Doc, don’t be scared. It’s a baby not an alien spaceship,” Tony told him, though everyone noticed he was keeping his distance from the kid.

The baby wriggled happily in Bruce’s gentle hold, pulling on the man’s tie and putting sticky fingers all over his glasses. Natasha smiled as she watched the antics of the child.

“He is cute,” she admitted, getting an audible reaction from the whole room. “What? I can’t like children?” she questioned with a severe look at the assembled company.

To a man, they all backed off and acted naturally until Romanoff’s face softened to it's usual, more neutral expression.

“He’s not shy,” said Barton, as the kid continued to gurgle his little noises and make good friends with Bruce apparently, not at all bothered that he was getting so much attention from the entire room.

“Are you sure he’s not yours?” Pepper asked Tony.

It was meant to be a joke, a reference to his own love of being in the spotlight. Unfortunately, there was an undercurrent of suspicion in her tone that not one amongst the team could have missed, even if they wanted to. It was true enough that Tony Stark had a reputation with the ladies. Sure, since he and Pepper decided to make it work between them romantically, she didn’t really believe he would’ve gone elsewhere looking for a good time. The problem was, this child was six months old, and it took nine to make a baby. It was over year ago when the liaison that created this child had to have occurred, leaving everyone to speculate on who the father, and indeed the mother, might be.

Darcy shifted her seat closer to Bruce’s own when the baby started reaching for her again and yet didn’t seem to want to be taken from the good doctor. They were his favourites apparently, at least for now. Kids were fickle enough it could be any other person in the next minute, especially if someone were to offer food or a shiny object to play with, no doubt.

“Look, I’m not denying the child is cute, or that perhaps he does need to stay here until we figure out where he came from,” said Steve eventually as he got up from his seat and tried to take over the meeting. “But we do need to come up with some kind of plan in the meantime. There is research to be done, witnesses to question, data to look into, but at the same time we need to figure out some kind of care for the baby.”

“Yes, we do,” agreed Tony.

“How hard can it be to care for one so tiny?” asked Thor with a hearty chuckle.

“Er, harder than you think,” Darcy told him quickly. “Kids this size? They’re not so bad, at least when they’re not crying. Once the tantrum starts, if you can’t figure out what baby wants, man, it gets messy.”

“He’s going to need clothing, formula milk, diapers...” said Natasha thoughtfully.

“A crib, potentially a car seat, plus toys,” Clint picked up where she left off. “Kids come with a lot of baggage, physical and otherwise.”

“Okay, so shopping,” said Tony, looking to Pepper. “We need to make a list.”

She dutifully pulled out a recording device and hit record, speaking clearly as she began the list. 

“Shopping list,” she said, going on to state everything she could think of that a baby might need.

“Shouldn’t job one be a name?” said Bruce then, trying not to laugh as the baby continued to amuse him. “I mean, it doesn’t really seem fair to keep calling him kid and junior,” he shrugged.

“But we have to presume he has a name already,” said Steve thoughtfully. “Did the mother not even put that in her message?” he physically checked the note, even though they all knew the name wasn’t there.

“Maybe she never named him,” said Natasha. “Too painful if she knew she was giving him away.”

“I have a suggestion,” said Thor, looking across at the happy child still held in Bruce’s arms. “In Asgard, some are named for their fathers, others for fallen heroes, or great allies. Perhaps... after Phil, Son of Coul?”

A distinct wave of awkward sadness went around the room at the memory of the fallen agent. They had avenged his death by beating back Loki and his army, but that didn’t bring Coulson back to life. It seemed a fitting tribute at least to name an innocent after a hero like him.

“All those in favour,” said Steve, raising his hand already.

Each and every person in the room quickly agreed. Even the baby seemed to lift his arm a little higher, copying everybody else around him.

“Motion carried,” said Pepper with a sad smile. “Baby Phil it is.”

There was a moment’s silence that seemed entirely appropriate before Tony cleared his throat and spoke again.

“Okay, so next item for the list - a nanny,” he nodded towards Pepper, but she didn’t add his suggestion to her recording.

“Tony, the whole point is that we don’t know where this child came from. We just agreed the authorities can’t know about him until we figure out who he is. Anyone we employ to take care of him would have to be completely trusted. The only people we can rely on like that are in this room.”

“Agreed,” he nodded once. “But none of us are exactly baby sitter material.”

“Seriously?” said Darcy with a look. “You’re prepared to battle aliens, fly into space, run into a war zone, but you’re all scared to try and take care of a little tiny baby?” she checked. “I mean, sure, it’s not quite as easy as Thor here thought it might be, but it’s also not exactly an extreme sport or anything.”

“I’ll take my turn at watching him,” Natasha shrugged. “If that’s what’s required.”

“Sure, me too,” her partner agreed.

“I am certain I can do something to be of help,” said Thor. “I insist on trying.”

“Um, okay,” Pepper considered. “Maybe a rota system? Teams of two, a few hours at a time?” she suggested, taking control of Tony’s screen and preparing a high-tech spreadsheet affair.

“Four hours, right?” said Tony with a slight frown. “Don’t they need food every four hours? Yeah, I’m sure I read that somewhere.”

“Pretty sure that’s new-borns, not kids this size,” said Darcy, trying not to grin too much. “Don’t they start on real food soon?” she said, looking mostly at Bruce.

“I would say so, yes,” he nodded some, not looking quite so uncomfortable with the baby in his lap anymore.

“Six hours divides the day up most evenly, but that lands the same people with the night shift every time, so four might be better actually,” Pepper considered as she continued working on her schedule. “Okay, me and Tony, since I don’t think anybody else can cope with you and a baby,” she said with a knowing look at her boyfriend. “Um, Natasha and Clint, I suppose, then Darcy and Bruce, and that leaves... Steve and Thor,” she frowned a little. “Um, we should rearrange this...”

“No, it’s fine,” said Steve definitely. “I don’t have that much experience, but enough to go on,” he said vaguely.

Pepper nodded and completed her schedule on the screen before transmitting it to everyone’s personal devices.

“Okay, for now, we have a plan,” she declared before turning her attention to the gurgling baby at the centre of the whole situation. “Welcome to the team, little Phil.”


	3. Chapter 3

_1st Shift - Darcy & Bruce_

Darcy hadn’t spent much time in the labs at Stark Tower. She was used to science stuff thanks to Jane and Erik, but the tech in this place was a cut above, no question. She was seeing it all now as she sat in a rare empty spot of the worktop, hands braced on the edge, legs swinging back and forth as if she were even younger than her years. She was a political science major so an awful lot of this meant very little to her, but it was kind of cool to see anyhow. Darcy figured if she wanted to know what anything was or how it worked she could just ask. Dr Banner was amenable to questions as far as she could tell (so long as they weren’t about The Other Guy) and he was way more likely to take her seriously than Tony ever was. That man had a snarky comment for just about everything.

“You always want to be a doctor, Bruce?” she asked conversationally, picking up a microscope lens and peering through it as if it were a magnifying glass and she were Nancy Drew.

“Er, I don’t know,” he said awkwardly, holding baby Phil still on the table as he continued his tests. “I guess, at least since I was a teenager. I was always interested in science, medicine, physics... To some it’s all very confusing or boring. I loved it,” he shrugged.

“I get it, I do,” Darcy considered, hopping down from the counter and wandering over to the doctor and his tiny patient. “I mean, when I first started interning for Jane, it was all gibberish to me, and pretty boring when all I was allowed to do was fetch coffee and drive the car,” she explained with accompanying eye roll. “But now it’s cool. I helped discover aliens,” she smiled widely.

“Yes, you did,” he agreed, as baby Phil giggled and chattered to himself.

He had both adults attention in a moment, and Darcy made a big fuss of him as Bruce ensured she had a hold of him so he could walk away. He had a blood sample spinning on a centrifuge, and a computer running data that Darcy wasn’t even sure about. She saw him take baby Phil’s temperature and various measurements. Mostly he was just ensuring the kid was normal and healthy, she supposed, but there had been talk about other tests too.

“You look human to me,” she told the baby, lifting him up off the table and hugging him close. “But hey, so does Thor, even Loki for the most part,” she considered.

“So far, he does appear to be as human as you and me,” said Bruce, glancing back at her. “Well, you anyway,” he corrected before going back to his work.

Darcy wasn’t sure what to make of this guy. She had seen both sides of him, though never the big green one in real life, only on film. Bruce was friendly and polite when she talked to him, but of course she knew why he was a little skittish in company. Since time began, there had always been men who got violent when they lost their temper, but none were quite like Bruce Banner and his Hulk alter-ago. Darcy found when she thought on it she could actually feel sorry for him and be in awe all at the same time.

“Y’know little Phil really likes you,” she smiled. “Kids don’t fawn all over just anybody.”

“Six month olds do,” he countered without ever looking up from his stats and figures. “Well, more or less anyway. He doesn’t know what I am, how could he?”

“Don’t underestimate babies, Dr B,” she said, bouncing the little one on her hip. “They have instincts that we don’t. They don’t judge on what they know, they judge on what they feel, what they see.”

“I thought you were majoring in political science, not philosophy or child psychology,” he said with hint of a smirk as he spared her one more glance.

Darcy didn’t answer that, but Phil made a nonsensical babble and managed to amuse himself as well as her. She was pretty sure even Bruce cracked a smile, though he was probably trying not to.

“Okay,” he said then, taking off his glasses as he turned around. “Vital signs are as they should be. As far as I can tell, what you’re holding is a perfectly happy, healthy human boy.”

“You missed out adorable!” said Darcy, hugging baby Phil close and kissing his temple as he continued to giggle.

Bruce watched her as she moved around the room, bouncing the baby and laughing along with him as he proved to be entirely entertained by her. The kid probably was completely normal, though there were more detailed tests to run if they were to establish that with any real certainty. Molecular level study, DNA checks, they could be done later after Bruce and Darcy finished their shift at taking care of baby Phil.

In the meantime, he found himself staring, not really on purpose but just because he couldn’t help it. It wasn’t as if he were blind to the beauty of the women all around him in Stark Tower, and Darcy definitely was beautiful. Still, he usually didn’t let himself think too much about it. He knew better than to think the age gap would matter or the fact they had very different interests or backgrounds. The problem would always be his anger issues. It made him nervous being around a baby, but he knew it would be okay so long as they weren’t left alone. Not that Darcy would be any match for the Hulk, but somehow she tended to be a calming influence on Bruce. He tried not to think too much about it, but he definitely had noticed. 

“Is Uncle Bruce staring at us?” she asked baby Phil then, prompting the doctor to look away immediately, feeling as if he had been caught out.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, surprised when he heard Darcy laugh.

“I wasn’t complaining,” she said with a look that might have been unmistakable if she were aiming it at anybody else.

Bruce couldn’t quite believe that she meant what it appeared she might have meant.

“We should get out of this place,” she said then. “Now your tests are done, probably better if we find a place with less glass and sharp corners.”

“Sure, yeah,” Bruce nodded his agreement, though he still felt a little dazed by what it seemed had just occurred.

Nevertheless he followed Darcy out of the lab, shaking his head as he went. The doctor that was also a monster was getting a crush on a girl and taking care of a mystery baby. Somehow Bruce thought it might have been less complicated to have to save New York all over again.

_2nd Shift - Tony & Pepper_

“Okay, is this how it’s going to be?” asked Tony as he looked across at Pepper on the opposite couch.

She had baby Phil sat in a recently bought high chair as she fed him pudding from a small spoon. It wasn’t that her feeding the baby was an issue, the kid had to eat, Tony knew that, it was the vibe coming off Pepper ever since the child had been delivered here.

Just as soon as Darcy and Bruce accepted they had first shift with the baby, Pepper had exited stage left and kept herself busy and unobtainable until it was hers and Tony’s turn to take over. He had no chance to talk to her until now, and yet she had barely said a word to him in the last half hour.

“C’mon, sweetie. Just a couple more spoonfuls,” said Pepper as baby Phil seemed dead-set on pressing his lips together tightly and not taking anymore food.

“You’re good at that,” Tony smiled as Phil gave in and accepted another bit of pudding into his mouth a moment later. “Y’know, the motherly thing.”

“Well, I’ve had plenty of practice,” she replied, not even looking over at her boyfriend.

“Really? I thought...” he began, before realising exactly what she meant.

Pepper hadn’t exactly been around a whole lot of kids, but she had dealt with him for years now. Tony Stark was well aware that he was the ultimate man-child a not small part of the time. He always thought that was just one of many facets of his personality that Pepper loved. Maybe it was, but right now she was just set in angry mode and wasn’t about to let up any time soon.

“I don’t know how many more ways I can find to tell you, that kid isn’t mine,” he shook his head as he got up and came over to crouch by the baby’s high chair, trying to get into Pepper’s eyeline if he possibly could. “What do you want? A plane to sky write it? A troupe of performers to act it out in interpretative dance? What? Because it can be arranged, right now...”

“Tony, just don’t,” she snapped, shifting away when his hand touched her knee. “Now is not the time, not in front of him,” she said, head tilting towards the baby.

Phil wriggled in his chair, looking between Pepper and Tony, and giggling like something was highly amusing. Honestly, neither of the couple were seeing anything funny about this situation. As far as Pepper was concerned the only reason for a woman to send a baby to Tony was because that child was his responsibility. She knew enough of his reputation to know it was entirely possible he had fathered a baby and given the age of the child, it could easily have happened, before she and Tony became romantically involved themselves. Even if he were the father, he wouldn’t have been cheating on her, but it was difficult not to feel as if he had somehow.

Pepper moved to put the bowl and spoon on the table, and when she looked back, Tony was getting Phil out of the high chair.“What are you doing?” she asked, puzzled since this was the first time Tony had shown any interest in getting within five feet of the baby.

“What? What does it look like I’m doing? I’m holding the baby,” he said awkwardly, a hand under each of Phil’s arms as he held him at almost arms length.

Pepper watched as Tony tried to figure out how best to manoeuvre the child, and came up empty on ideas. One of the smartest men on the planet, he could build a robotic suit with the ability to fly, an arc reactor that could power a whole building, and recreate an element long thought lost, but for the life of him Tony Stark did not know how to hold a baby.

“Here,” she said, taking pity on Phil as much as Tony. “Hold him closer, put your hand here,” she instructed, moving his arms around the baby who soon looked much more comfortable.

“Hey, kid” Tony smiled down at Phil who looked perfectly happy. “Uncle Tony’s not so bad, huh?” he checked.

Little Phil babbled the noises all babies tended to make before they could talk. Whether his ‘words’ were positive or negative was anybody’s guess.

“You think you can tell Aunt Pepper not to be so mad at me?” he asked the baby. “I think you have more chance of her listening to you than I do.”

He looked across at his girlfriend then who tried not to smile. How she was supposed to stay mad at Tony, she would never know. He always found a way around her, and right now he was just being way too cute to ignore.

“I know I should trust you,” she sighed. “I do, honestly, it’s just...”

“When all evidence suggests an answer, it’s kind of hard to ignore it.”

It was quite the sensible thing for Tony to say, which wasn’t altogether normal for him. Pepper had noticed he had these very serious moments occasionally, more often lately than ever before. The Battle of New York changed him, it changed everybody in various ways. She hoped the alterations she saw in Tony were ultimately for the better. As much fun as it was to have him be spontaneous and a little crazy sometimes, he could use a dose of serious once in a while to balance it out.

“I guess we’ll know for sure when Bruce is done with his tests,” she considered. “He took all the samples during his shift with Darcy. Should have some concrete results in the next twenty four hours.”

Tony nodded that he understood, repositioning the baby in his arms when Phil seemed very interested in something over his shoulder and tried to make a kind of escape. Pepper moved closer and reached out to help, encouraging the child not to scramble so much for fear he would fall and hurt himself. His attention was soon taken by her pretty red hair and the stones that sparked at her ears. Phil was as transfixed by Pepper as Tony suddenly seemed to be.

“Y’know,” he said, getting her full attention, “if I ever do get me one of these things, I want him or her to have red hair, green eyes, and way more good sense than I have,” he smiled.

Pepper was still bowled over every time he said something like that, but she refused to let him know it on principal.

“You’re an idiot,” she rolled her eyes, hoping that somehow that would stop the happy tears from forming, even though she knew it was too late. “But I love you,” she declared, unable to help herself as she leaned in to kiss his lips.

Between them, Phil clapped his hands and laughed out loud, making the adults chuckle too. Whoever’s baby he really was, he sure seemed happy enough.

_3rd Shift - Clint & Natasha_

Tony had looked sceptical when it came to handing over baby Phil to two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. He trusted them in a fight, to always get the job done when it came to retrievals, spying, security. Taking care of a baby was a whole other ballgame, and he wondered at the apparent enthusiasm of Barton and Romanoff to take part in baby-sitting duties.

“It’s what is required,” said Natasha mechanically as she lifted the child from Pepper’s arms.

Baby Phil observed her a moment, trying to figure out who this next person was that he was being handed to. It wasn’t long before he was reaching for Nat’s pretty red hair and jabbering away as if in full on conversation with her. An unlikely smile curved her lips and in spite of Tony’s worries, Pepper was quite happy to leave them all be.

“Just because we’re agents, we have handled children before,” said Clint. “And y’know, we were kids once too.”

“Really? You guys aren’t grown in labs?” said Tony, perhaps only semi-joking.

It was at this point that Pepper put a hand on his shoulder and bodily removed him from the room. Clint watched them go, more amused than offended, then turned his attention back to Nat and the baby.

“I guess it takes some serious imagination to think of us as anything but what we are now,” he said, walking over, taking baby Phil’s hand when it was waved in his direction. “We don’t exactly come off as the cuddly type.”

“An agent can adapt to any situation, at least, they should be able to,” Nat reminded him of what they both already knew. “Just because our line of work doesn’t usually involve baby-sitting, doesn’t mean it’s impossible for us to handle.”

She was proven right as time went on. Baby Phil wriggled to be put down after a while and seemed to enjoy just rolling around on the floor, trying to crawl but not quite managing it.

“He’s young yet, and probably tired,” said Nat when he made another attempt to co-ordinate his limbs and promptly fell on his face - even then he didn’t cry.

“He’s a fighter though,” remarked Clint, getting down to the baby’s level. “Aren’t you, champ? And y’know, just ‘cause you haven’t had the best start in life, there’s hope for you yet.”

Natasha watched her partner as he played with the baby. He had such empathy for the child abandoned at a young age. His own backstory told a similar tale, only there had been no band of heroes to take the young Barton in. His parents hadn’t left him out of choice but when death took them, he had suffered at the hands of others. That would never happen to this child, the one they had agreed to name Phil after a fallen comrade.

Natasha respected the choice to call him after Coulson, and had no problem protecting the baby with her life if that was what was deemed to be required. She wondered if Director Fury knew anything about this yet. It was unlikely Stark would go to him, and the others all seemed to take point from Iron Man’s alter-ego. Right now, the bigger picture was decidedly blurry, but that never bothered an agent like Romanoff. She focused on the job at hand, protecting and taking care of the child as she had been asked to do.

“Hey, it’s okay,” said Clint then as baby Phil knocked over the tower of plastic blocks Barton had built for him and looked decidedly unhappy at his own actions. “No worries, buddy, we can rebuild...”

Clint didn’t get to say anymore as Phil started to scream and cry like the world was ending. Pulling the kid into his lap and trying to console him did no good. Nat checked the clock and then moved to join the pair on the floor.

“It’s probably his bed time,” she noted, putting her hand to the baby’s red face. “Somebody is over-tired from their big day.”

“Only a little,” said Clint with a smirk, even though they both knew she wasn’t talking about him.

Rolling her eyes, she held out her hands to take the baby from her partner and stood up, hugging him close. The had needed to change Phil not a half hour before, and Nat had enough foresight to put the kid into his pyjamas at the same time. She saw his turn towards sleepy coming apparently, though Clint didn’t know how Nat had come to have such a affinity with children. He couldn’t hear what she was saying to the baby now, he assumed they were just whispered words of comfort as Nat rocked Phil a little against her chest and tried to calm him down.

She wandered through to the next room where the crib resided. It hadn’t taken much to set up a suite for the baby. Now it was all fully furnished with everything a person could ever need when it came to caring for a six month old, plus a few necessities for the grown ups too, especially when it came to the night shift. Two couches that folded out to beds, a TV and games console, complete with headphones, and a well-stocked fridge to name but a few amenities. Clint figured Thor and Steve might make good use of those when it came to their shift. After all, with a little luck baby Phil would sleep right through their four hour stint. It would probably be better for everyone concerned if he did.

Clint got up from the floor and followed on into the adjoining room, amazed to realise that Phil was no longer making a sound. Natasha was still talking as she leant over the crib stroking the baby’s hair. At least, Clint thought she was talking. It took a moment to realise that she was actually singing softly in her mother tongue.

“Look at you with your magical maternal instincts,” he whispered from his spot leant in the doorway.

“No magic, and nothing exceptionally maternal,” she bristled at the remark. “Just a Russian lullaby.”

She breezed by him to the main room, sat herself down on a couch and flipped open a book without another word. The shutters had come down, ones that he recognised because he had to use them himself, of course. In their line of work it was entirely necessary, but with each other it was often different. There were times when Barton and Romanoff had shared rather more than it was usual for partner agents to know about each other, but it was clear that Nat was not in a sharing mood right now. Clint knew better than to approach her again tonight.

_4th Shift - Steve & Thor_

“If this is all there is to child care, it is not the difficulty of which Darcy spoke,” said Thor, leaning back on the couch with his feet up.

“It’s fine for as long as the baby is sleeping,” Steve told him. “When he wakes up, which he probably will before long, it’s not quite so simple.”

“You know much of raising children, Rogers?” his baby-sitting partner enquired, looking at Steve from across the back of the couch.

“Some,” he nodded. “There were kids around when I was younger, the neighbours babies and little ones...”

He got a distant look in his eyes when he talked about them, a past long gone by, and Thor didn’t need to ask why. Though in Asgard the people lived thousands of years without batting an eye, the mortals of Midgard were supposed to live not more than a hundred years, often no more than seventy, even less. Steve Rogers existance had begun much longer ago than this, and still his appearance was that of a young soldier. Everyone he had known had long since perished, family and friends, perhaps even the children he recalled. The woman he loved was old now and failing in health. It could not be easy for Steve, imagining a life he might have had back then.

It made Thor think of his own life too, what his future might yet be. Though he knew his feelings of love for Jane to be strong and true, he was not blind to the problems they may yet face. She belonged here and he amongst the stars she watched through telescopes and technology. He had lived centuries, millennia already and would yet still, whilst she would grow old and die in a mere fifty years or so. Thor would need an heir, as Odin had before him, and there was no telling if Jane was even capable of producing one with him.

“Do you consider your future, Rogers?” he asked his team-mate. “A wife, children of your own?”

“No,” he shook his head and answered seriously, coming to join Thor on the couch. “I can’t imagine even being in love, not again.”

It was a sore subject and Thor wished immediately he had not brought it up. He laid a hand on the other man’s shoulder.

“My apologies, Captain,” he said sincerely. “I did not mean to cause you pain of the heart.”

Steve opened his mouth to say it was fine when the relative silence was pierced by a loud cry. Baby Phil was awake and clearly unamused. Immediately, both Steve and Thor were up and headed for the bedroom. They both peered down into the crib where the baby kicked his legs wildly, dislodging his blanket and getting more and more red in the face as he screamed and wailed.

“Does he require nourishment?

“I don’t think so,” said Steve with a shake of his head.

Natasha and Clint had fed baby Phil during their shift and at his age he shouldn’t need night feeds. Reaching into the crib with careful hands, Steve picked up the crying child and cradled him against his chest. A pungent smell immediately made itself known, and the odour of it hitting the two heroes’ nostrils showed in the looks on their faces.

“This task will be unpleasant,” said Thor, turning away a moment. “But we have faced worse.”

Steve knew he was right. They had indeed faced much worse than this - an alien invasion, battles of war, mighty adversaries - but that didn’t mean what they were about to deal with was going to be in any way fun.

“Er, do you know how these new-fangled diapers work?” he asked as he gestured towards the supplies on the table.

Thor frowned hard and shook his head.

“What is a diaper?”


	4. Chapter 4

_5th Shift - Darcy & Bruce_

“Wow, you look... motivated,” said Bruce with a smirk he couldn’t help as Darcy wandered into the room.

She was a little later than the agreed handover time, but given it was what some might call stupid-o’clock in the morning, nobody was holding any grudges. From what they had said, Steve and Thor had not had a great time of it, learning how to change diapers with little Phil crying on and off ever since then. He was quiet for now, but Bruce didn’t hold out much hope for the entire shift being so easy. In some ways he hoped it wasn’t. Being alone with Darcy was something he was a little nervous about right now, or he had been until he saw how tired and out of it she looked.

“Don’t mess with me, Banner!” she warned, coming over to slump down on the other end of the couch. “No human person can be expected to function at this time of the night.”

“Most people being asked to aren’t entirely human,” he noted with a wry smile.

Darcy turned her head to stare at him, her eyes no more open and yet entirely focused apparently.

“You do that a lot,” she noted, keeping his gaze. “The whole ‘I’m not a person’ riff. Gets a little old, Doc.”

“I can’t change it,” he shrugged, pulling his eyes away from her searching look. “And it’s not self-pity, at least not anymore, it’s just a fact to be aware of.”

She had to wonder why he was making such a big deal right now. It was past two in the morning and they were on babysitting duty for a mystery child, the truth about which they didn’t stand a chance of knowing until the DNA results and medical tests were done. There was no hurrying the processes all the samples and such had to go through. Bruce had suggested on the first shift together that he wouldn’t have all the data collated until after their second round of child minding duty anyway.

Darcy had to wonder if it was baby Phil’s heritage that was making Bruce think about his own. He had been born human, as far as Darcy had been told, but gamma rays had made him go big and green whenever he let the anger out. He was still a person underneath it all though, more often than he was a big green rage monster anyway.

“Are you telling me I should be afraid, be very afraid?” she asked with laughter in her voice. “Because that’s not really my style, not anymore.”

He glanced over at her just as her eyes slid shut. She was clearly quite willing to nap for as long as Phil was asleep and Bruce wasn’t about to stop her. He had to wonder though if part of her thinking in closing her eyes the moment she was done talking was so he couldn’t argue. It was one way to get the last word he supposed.

She certainly would be afraid if faced with The Other Guy, he was certain on that, and anyone who wasn’t had to be a fool. Sure, Darcy had taken on a god-like alien and cohabited here with a super-soldier, trained assassins, and the like, but what Bruce was, what he was capable of, it was too much for anyone to handle. He needed her to know that, before her flirtatious behaviour led to anything else. He didn’t expect it to, he wouldn’t dare to dream, but he was going for preventative measures here, proactively putting her off before anything turned her on. Yeah, that was badly phrased, he thought, rubbing is forehead when it began to ache. Maybe he was a little sleep-deprived too.

It would be an hour before any more conversation occurred between Bruce and Darcy, mostly because within moments of sleep claiming her, it slayed the doctor too. Baby Phil stayed quiet for quite a while but then just as suddenly woke and became unhappy. He wriggled and cried in his crib, getting louder all the time, when suddenly he let out an almighty wail.

Bruce woke with a jump, forcing his breathing to be even, wondering why sitting up wasn’t quite as easy as it should be. It was then that he realised his head had been leaning on Darcy’s own that was in turn propped on his shoulder. She started to stir right when he was just noticing how pretty she looked, how comfortable they both must have been.

“What...?” she muttered as she came to, picking her head up and wincing at the continued crying of the baby. “What’s up, Doc?” she joked in spite of the situation, mostly because Bruce looked way more freaked than a person should in the circumstances.

“Er, we should go see what’s wrong,” he said fast, leaping from the couch and hurrying towards the baby’s bedroom.

Darcy got up at a more reasonable speed and straightened out her top that had gotten messed while she was sleeping. Sure, it mattered that they dealt with baby Phil if he was upset, but that wasn’t what Bruce’s entire reaction had been about, she was certain. Never had she known a guy so skittish about women, about people in general. It wasn’t like she didn’t understand what made him so cautious, but no harm had come to anybody while they were sleeping all snuggly. Actually she really had been super-comfortable.

“Bad timing, little Phil,” she muttered as she followed on into the next room.

Bruce looked awkward though he had gotten the little one out of the crib and was holding him like a pro. The baby was still crying some, but not as loud as before.

“What’s the problem, little man?” asked Darcy as she came over to see.

She felt his head, gave his butt a cursory sniff. As far as she could tell he wasn’t feverish and he didn’t need changing.

“All the confusion, the changing hands every few hours, it can’t be helping his state of mind,” said Bruce thoughtfully, quickly handing Phil off to Darcy.

“I don’t know,” she sighed, holding the baby close and rocking him a little a she shushed him. “I think maybe he just wants some company right now, doesn’t matter who. I mean, you could say he’d be better off with his mother or father or whoever, but until we know where and what he comes from, can’t really say for sure, right?”

“Right,” Bruce nodded his agreement, folding his arms across himself.

Darcy couldn’t help but think it was a deliberate act to stop her handing Phil back to him. That made her smile, because it was too cute, and then it made her sad, because she knew it was because he was more afraid of what he was than anyone else had ever been.

“So, what? We get the results after our shift, right?” she asked, making soothing sounds to the baby when he started to cry again, but mostly was falling back to sleep in her arms.

“Not immediately,” said Bruce absently, watching Darcy and the baby with too much intensity for a moment. “But soon after, yes. We should have a definite answer on his DNA and bloods, so parentage should be easier to figure out.”

“Well, cute as he is, gotta think his parents aren’t exactly suffering in the looks department,” Darcy smiled down at the peacefully slumbering little man in her arms. “That counts Tony out as father,” she chuckled, loving that Bruce did the same. “You sure he’s not yours?” she asked then, one eyebrow quirked.

Dr Banner looked away.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” he muttered, walking past her and right out of the room.

Darcy bit her lip. She liked to flirt, that was just the way she was. Working here, surrounded by guys, none of which were exactly bad to look at and most of which liked the banter as much as she did, it was practically a playground for a woman like Miss Lewis. Bruce was different. In her opinion, he was probably the nicest of the guys and actually better looking too. Sure, Thor was built like Adonis and she wouldn’t say no, if he weren’t already taken by Jane, but she was really getting to like Bruce, maybe more so because he presented a challenge to her.

“Do me a favour, little man?” she whispered to baby Phil as she leaned over and placed him back in the crib. “When you grow up into a man, have some communication skills, ‘kay?”

When she walked quietly back into the other room, Bruce had his nose in a newspaper and was clearly hoping to avoid a conversation. For now, Darcy would let him be, but only because baby Phil came first. At some point she and Banner were going to have a serious conversation about his attitude when it came to people liking him or caring about him. She wasn’t letting this one go.

_6th Shift - Tony & Pepper_

Tony thought the whole concept of noise-cancelling headphones was just really cool. They had so many uses, one of which he figured would be to blast AC/DC into his ears so he couldn’t hear the constant screaming and bawling of the baby in the next room. Of course Pepper didn’t seem to think that was okay. In fact, she looked pretty pissed when she realised she had been talking to a man who couldn’t hear a word she was saying for fully five minutes. She tore the headphones from his ears and plopped the squalling child into his lap with a huff. Tony wasn’t impressed.

“I’ve changed him, I’ve tried to feed him, I’ve burped him, and I’ve sung a lullaby,” she rattled off, pushing her hair off her face and looking genuinely exhausted. “I don’t know what else there is.”

If she didn’t, it was highly unlikely her boyfriend would, and yet apparently he was supposed to. Manouevring the baby into a comfortable position on his knees, Tony put a careful hand to the kid’s head. He was warm, probably from getting so worked up, but maybe it was something else.

“You think he’s sick?” he checked. “We have a thermometer or something around here, right?” he asked, craning his neck to see if he could spot where one might be.

Pepper was gone when he turned her way and then back in a second with a device that she switched on and carefully placed in baby Phil’s ear. A few seconds later she pulled it out and read the display. 

“98.8,” she said with a slight frown. “That’s not really a fever,” she considered. “Probably just because he’s upset and flustered.”

“Probably,” Tony agreed, picking up the baby in his arms and going over towards the window.

He pulled on a handle that opened the top part a little, so that a trickle of cool morning air came in. Maybe that wasn’t quite the right thing to do, but he was going on instinct. The baby was hot, cool him down. The baby was upset, try to make him happier. He jostled the little one against his chest and encouraged him to be calm. Tony was pretty much waiting for Pepper to tell him he was doing wrong, even though the kid did seem to be quieting down again. When he looked back towards the couch, he realised why she was so quiet. Pepper had her head back against the cushions and her hands over her face. She seemed so tired.

“Did you not sleep at all before we came in here for our turn?” he asked with concern he felt for few people but she was most definitely one.

“A little,” she sighed heavily. “I just... I feel so bad for him,” she said, gesturing towards the baby in Tony’s arms. “I wanted to do everything I could, so I spent quite a while going over the video feeds from the main foyer, looking for clues on the packaging he came in... It was pointless, but at least I tried, right?”

Tony watched her pained expression. He wanted to ask if all her worry was based on her belief that this was his baby, if she wanted to disprove it so she didn’t have to keep trying to convince herself anymore. It should hurt that she didn’t entirely trust him, but no. Tony knew he didn’t have the best track record, he couldn’t blame Pepper for her concerns, not really.

Still, he knew himself this kid was not his own. It was almost a shame because as babies went he was kind of cute and mostly well-behaved until the recent screaming fit. He was certainly calming down now, falling asleep against Tony’s chest in fact, and that had to be a good thing. Tony wandered back to the couch and sat down carefully next to Pepper. Phil wriggled a little, his hand going towards his mouth. Sucking on his own fingers, he was soon still again.

“Who knew I had a knack for this?” he smirked, looking sideways at Pepper.

Her hands were gone from her face now and she smiled back because she just couldn’t help it.

“You’re always full of surprises,” she noted, the very thought of it taking the smile from her face in a moment.

This baby had come as a huge surprise, and he might yet prove to be of Tony’s making. He insisted otherwise and every part of Pepper wanted to believe him, it was just so hard to actually do. There was a chance the kid belonged to any one of the guys on the team, but somehow she couldn’t rationalise it. Thor was completely in love with Jane Foster but she couldn’t think for a second that woman would abandon her child. Bruce had been found in a remote area of the world and took all the convincing there was to be amongst colleagues and friends, never mind women in any sexual way, he was too afraid of what he was still. Steve was just too much of an old-fashioned gentleman for a one night stand or anything, and that left Clint Barton, whose own history dictated that he would never abandon a child he knew existed and would most likely take great pains to ensure such a thing never happened by accident. That only left one candidate – Tony, who had a reputation for sleeping with a great string of women, at least up until the day he committed himself to Pepper. This child had been made before they officially got together, so even if Tony was the father, he wouldn't have broken his promise to Pepper. He was trying so hard and changing his ways so well, but that didn't change what may have happened in the past, and she hated that she might not be able to move past that.

“You’re thinking too much, I can tell,” said the man himself.

Pepper scoffed at that.

“Seriously? Look who’s talking!” she shook her head and sighed. “We should get him back in his crib,” she said then, gesturing to baby Phil.

Tony got up with a nod and took the little one back to his bed. He laid him carefully down and couldn’t help but smile as the little guy snuffled slightly in his sleep and then continued to breathe evenly. He returned to the main room to find Pepper no long alone.

“Bruce?” he greeted the doctor with a questioning look.

“I’m sorry,” he replied softly, realising the baby would be asleep. “I thought you’d want to know what I found as soon as possible,” he said, looking too concerned for the news to be good.

“So, first thing first, are any of the team the kid’s father?” asked Tony straight-out, eyes never wavering though he knew Pepper’s were fixed on him.

“No, I can definitely say no member of this team is connected to baby Phil by DNA,” said Bruce definitely.

Pepper visibly relaxed throughout her entire body. After a moment of recovery she felt the need to ask more.

“But now you have Phil’s data processed, we can find his actual father, right? Maybe his mother too?” she checked.

“Well, that might be a little harder than we thought...” said Bruce awkwardly, handing over the papers in his hands for the couples inspection.

Two pairs of wide eyes eventually looked up from the page, first at each other and then at the doctor.

“Phil is... He’s not entirely human.”

_7th Shift - Clint & Natasha_

Clint was feeding baby Phil his lunch, or at least trying to. The kid seemed to think it was highly amusing to close his mouth at the last minute and evade the spoon, giggling like a crazy person when Clint huffed and puffed in over-acted exasperation. He persevered because that was what you did with kids, and he smiled and laughed along with Phil the same as he had last shift.

Natasha wasn’t quite so comfortable.

They knew now that the child was not entirely human. The DNA results suggested at least half mortal, but it was the other half Banner was having problems identifying. He had eliminated a couple of options thanks to samples they had from others. Phil had no Asgardian blood, and no foreign elements forced into his body like gamma rays or super serums. One of his parents was not of Earth, they just didn’t know for sure where he or she had come from.

“He’s still the same kid,” said Clint, wiping a splatter of baby food from his shirt. “You don’t have to look at him that way.”

“What way?” asked his partner, though they were both very aware that he knew her better than to believe she didn’t know what she was doing. “You’re not concerned about what he is?” she asked then, one eyebrow quirked.

Clint sighed.

“Concerned? Not really,” he shrugged. “Curious? Sure.”

“We all know what curiosity did for the cat,” said Natasha then, a smirk on her lips that she couldn’t help.

“Got him a job as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?” he considered, smiling as much as she was. “Whatever or whoever baby Phil is, he’s still him, and he’s still an innocent in all this.”

“It’s how we all start out, I guess,” she considered, wondering at how she could barely remember a time when that was true of herself.

Innocence. It was a distant memory, a whisper in the dark from so long ago now she barely recalled it at all. At Phil’s age she must have been pure, but not for long. All that red...

“With all the resources Stark has in this place, the pull with Fury and all, can’t think it’ll take too long to figure out the mystery,” said Clint, deciding that Phil could live without the last two or three spoonfuls of lunch.

It was just too much effort to keep trying, especially when the kid was getting antsy. Clint cleaned up his own shirt, changed Phil’s for a fresh one, then lifted him out of the high chair.

“As you say, between Stark’s technology, Banner’s brains, and the S.H.I.E.L.D. databases, it can’t be that hard to figure out the truth, but then what?” Natasha asked seriously. “I’m not saying he isn’t a cute kid, but if he is something other-worldly, something dangerous...”

She shook her head, knowing that neither of them wanted her to say anymore. The very idea of taking care of a situation like that, a baby who needed to be locked up or eliminated entirely because of the risk he posed, it wasn’t pretty. Usually, Barton and Romanoff would just do what they must, without thinking. It was much harder when the target of a hit was someone you knew, harder still when you knew for sure how innocent the person was, when he was just a child.

“No use worrying about it until we know the truth, I guess,” sighed Clint. “For now, we can just act like everything is normal, for his sake, if nothing else,” he smiled crookedly at the baby he was now bouncing on his knees.

Nat smirked.

“When he pukes on you, you’re cleaning it up all by yourself,” she told him, sitting down beside him, reaching out a hand to little Phil’s head.

He looked over at her on the feel of contact, giggling and smiling, reaching out to grab her fingers. It was strange for Natasha, to have someone put trust and faith in her like that, to offer smiles and a strange kind of love. Babies and small children, they were so very innocent and pure at this age. They cared nothing for what you had done in your past or what you might do yet in your future. Your job, your looks, your clothes, your habits, it didn’t matter. So long as you did them no harm, a child would love you, just for being there, feeding them, playing with toys, singing a lullaby.

“Sometimes I think I could get used to this,” said Clint thoughtfully, eyes trained on Phil even though he was obviously talking to Natasha. “I mean, I love my job, but someday the whole settling down thing. Might be okay.”

She deliberately looked away a second before he turned to meet her eyes. Things between her and Clint were so undefined. They had been through a lot together, that was for sure. To think that the day they met he was supposed to bring her down. Now they were, for lack of a better term, the best of friends.

It had frightened her so much more than she would ever have admitted when Barton was under Loki’s control. She hoped more than believed she could bring him back from that and now that she had, the relief continued to be immense, even months later. If she had lost him, she wasn’t sure how she would have coped. That was never a consideration before, not with anybody else. She just rose above and pushed through. Barton was different, he had always been different, but knowing that and admitting it, even to herself nevermind to him, those were two vastly different things.

“I can adapt to a lot of situations,” she considered. “But motherhood is not something likely to come naturally to me.”

There was no way to avoid looking at him forever and Natasha made herself meet Clint’s gaze then.

“I understand your need to ensure the safety of other children, to want to help people who went through the same things you did,” she admitted. “But I’m not sure that’s a partnership that I would be suited to.”

“I don’t know,” he shrugged, handing over baby Phil when he wriggled and stretched, practically desperate to go to Nat apparently. “You seem like a natural to me.”

Phil flung his arms out wide and bodily threw himself into Nat’s chest, hugging her as best as a baby could hug an adult. She held him close, rubbing his back, as an oddly soft smile came to her lips. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to do this for real one day. Still, the thought continued to echo in the back of her mind, that this child could be anyone or anything, and that they might yet have to be the ones to deal with the consequences when the truth was uncovered. That sent a chill down the spine of even the most hardened agent, as proven when Natasha Romanoff shivered and held baby Phil closer.

_8th Shift - Steve & Thor_

Thor looked decidedly skittish when he first entered baby Phil’s room for his second shift. Nobody ever saw the god-like man look afraid of anything, and Steve would not say he had seen such a thing even now, but Thor was certainly uncomfortable after their last turn at playing baby-sitters.

Diapers were a whole new world to Steve Rogers. In his day they were simple cloth affairs with safety pins. Modern technology was a wonderful thing but he was amazed by the space age type items used to take care of babies these days. Once again, he felt far too old and out-dated for the world in which he had awoken.

“I fear I understand why it is almost exclusively women who were made to take care of children,” said Thor with due consideration. “They must be better equipped than you and I, perhaps with a part of the brain specifically designed for such a task.”

“Traditionally it’s mothers that raise children,” Steve agreed with a shrug. “But I guess it’s like anything else in life. If you have to adapt, you can.”

“That much I know to be true,” Thor nodded once. “The Lady Sif from my home land of Asgard has become a most feared warrior, though such a title would usually be bestowed only upon men,” he considered. “It can work in both ways, I suppose.”

Baby Phil certainly didn’t seem to mind any of the men and women who had been looking after him of late. He was in a perfectly happy mood when Clint and Natasha were replaced by Steve and Thor, though he did wave the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent’s off with some sadness for a moment.

It was odd to think a woman like Natasha Romanoff could ever be motherly. She was very hard and cold from what Steve had seen of her, but he could understand that. He had known women that had to be that way because of their jobs, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t be feminine, or that they didn’t crack under pressure eventually. Yes, he was thinking of Peggy Carter, as he so often did, wondering what kind of mother she might have been to children that looked like him. It was the one downside to this situation of taking care of a small child, wondering what might have been.

“According to Banner, he is close to discovering the origin’s of the baby’s mother and father,” said Thor then, smiling at the little one as he rolled himself across the carpet happily. “What land he might hail from is certainly a mystery. I do not know many that take this form that you and I possess.”

Steve sometimes forgot that Thor was an alien. He looked like a man, albeit a very strong and muscular one, despite the fact he ate like a ten year old boy with no parental supervision! Baby Phil looked human enough and yet there were doubts. He was not of Earth nor Asgardian. There were plenty of other worlds but still whoever or whatever made the child had to have been here on Earth at some point surely, and must be humanoid to have made a baby that looked like Phil.

“Science like that is lost on me,” Steve admitted. “But I trust in Dr Banner to find the truth, and in this team to do what is right in the end.”

“I do think Banner would have more luck if Darcy was not always in his presence,” Thor chuckled then, partly at the baby’s antics, partly at his own thoughts. “She does seem quite determined to be his friend even as he shies away from all of us.”

“I guess it’s hard for him, being what he is, changing the way he does,” Steve said thoughtfully. “Getting close to someone when you know you could lose them or hurt them.”

“Darcy is strong enough,” said Thor definitely. “She is not easily afraid or anything, and she is one of the most determined women I have ever known. When you consider, I grew up with Freya for a mother, and the Lady Sif as my childhood companion, you know then that I have known women of great determination.”

“Miss Lewis does seem to go for what she wants and not stop until she gets it,” Steve considered with a smile, rather glad that he wasn’t Darcy’s chosen target.

She was a nice girl, but perhaps a little too much for him to handle himself right now. Pushing herself at Bruce might not be the brightest move given what could happen when he lost control, but Steve had learnt a long time ago that women had their own minds just as men did, sometimes to a greater degree actually. If Darcy wanted to pursue a relationship with the good doctor, be it friendship or something else, he didn’t suppose it was anyone else’s business, so long as it didn’t affect the team as a whole.

“No, little one.” 

Steve startled a little when Thor’s booming voice spoke again and he moved onto the floor near the baby.

“This is not to be eaten,” he smiled at little Phil, gently removing the book from his grasp. “It is to be read and enjoyed. Entertainment and knowledge in one.”

Phil stared up at him curiously, babbling away in his own little code that made sense only to him. Thor glanced down at the book in his hand and then looked back at Steve on the couch.

“This is a child’s reading material?” he checked, eyeing ‘The Cat in the Hat’ with some suspicion.

“I guess so,” his partner considered. “It’s not something I’ve ever heard of myself.”

“Very well,” said Thor, moving to sit with his back against the bottom of the couch and got a hold of the baby.

Little Phil curled up happily with his friend the alien man, immediately reaching for the book that had tasted so good. It was pulled from his grasp the moment he made a grab at it.

“No,” Thor repeated firmly but kindly. “This is a book. The words are read and the pictures are observed. No part is for nourishment,” he enforced upon the child, before clearing his throat and beginning to read aloud from page one.

“The sun did not shine, it was too wet to play, so we sat in the house all that cold, cold wet day. I sat there with Sally. We sat here we two, and we said how we wish we had something to do...”

Steve found it quite amusing to see and hear a man such as Thor reading such words aloud to a giggling child. He supposed he would hardly seem any the less serious in Thor’s position, but it was still pretty funny.

Unfortunately, their quiet revelry was soon disturbed.

“Hey, guys,” said Tony as he appeared at the door.

Steve and Thor were clearly surprised to see him and it showed on both their faces.

“There is news of some kind?” the Asgardian checked, lifting the baby higher in his arms as Phil wriggled to be free to roam.

“You got it in one, Point Break,” Tony nodded once. “Conference room in ten, okay? And bring the wriggly one,” he smiled slightly.

That look was forced, Steve knew that even at this range. The meeting they were having would be to reveal baby Phil’s origins and as important as that was, he kind of dreaded learning the ugly truth. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as all that. Even if the child wasn’t human, it didn’t make him automatically bad. Thor hailed from another world and was an ally after all.

“You are thinking unpleasantly, Captain,” his partner said then. “These are troubling times, but the truth must be known, or we shall not be able to do what is right and best for the child.”

“I know,” Steve nodded his agreement. “But sometimes the right thing and the best thing really aren’t the same. What do you do then?”


	5. Chapter 5

 

It was a very similar set up to the first meeting at which baby Phil had been present, the same one at which he had been discovered. The team sat in roughly the same seats, with Darcy holding on to the kid who was dozing in her lap. It was late, and the fatigue was showing in some of the faces around the table. Everybody had taken their turn at baby-sitting, and when they weren’t doing that there was research into how little Phil got here, who his parents might be, what the next step was. It seemed at least they had some answers now, enough to call a meeting. Not a person here was particularly happy or sad to know the truth was coming, because said truth might not be what anybody wanted to hear.

“So, the tests are complete but not entirely conclusive,” Dr Banner explained from front and centre, wishing he was anywhere else when he glanced over at Darcy with baby Phil in her lap. “Er, the DNA test alone proves that nobody in this room is the parent or even a close relative to the child,” he explained, gesturing vaguely with his glasses in his hand. “What that and the other tests also show is that the make-up of Phil is not entirely human.”

“So far you speak truths that we are already aware of,” said Thor with an edge of anger to his voice. “Speak plainly, Banner. If you know from where this child hails, tell us now.”

Nobody wanted to tell the Asgardian he should be patient, not because of his strength and power, but moreover because they all agreed with him. Bruce had a habit of looking awkward when addressing the room, an issue born out of his self-imposed solitude amongst other things they all supposed, but today was a particularly big day for everybody. Baby Phil gurgled and wriggled to get more comfortable before dozing off again against Darcy with his thumb in his mouth. She absently stroked the child’s head and nodded at Bruce to spit it out already.

“The truth is that half of Phil’s DNA is human, and we have to presume that’s the mother’s side,” he explained, a display running across the holo-screen that flashed above the conference table, even though the symbols and numbers meant very little to most of those present. “His paternity however is a little more troubling...”

“Let’s speed things up here,” said Tony, the only other person in the room that already knew the disturbing discovery Bruce had made. “Long story short, the father may in fact be someone we all know and loathe,” he explained as he got to his feet and faced the assembled company. “We think it might be Loki.”

That got a real reaction. Thor stood up fast like he intended to say or do something epic and yet he didn’t seem to know where to begin. Darcy stared down at the child in her arms with something most definitely akin to shock. Such an expression was shared by so many around the table, as was understandable.

“How sure are you about this?” asked Steve, voicing what many were no doubt wondering.

“As sure as we can be,” Bruce told him. “We cross-referenced the sample of Phil’s DNA with all those in both the database Tony and I have been compiling and the S.H.I.E.L.D. data Director Fury gave us access to.”

“Does he know...?” asked Pepper, but Tony immediately shook his head.

“No, we told him as little as possible. Not that I don’t trust the guy but... well, I don’t entirely trust the guy,” he shrugged.

Natasha smirked a little at that but was serious again in a second as she glanced from Stark and Banner to the baby then right back again.

“How dangerous could he be?” she asked pointedly. “I know it’s not a question anybody wants to ask, not even me, but shouldn’t we be concerned by the threat this child could pose if he is the son of such a maniac?”

“Have a care, Miss Romanoff,” said Thor firmly. “Though Loki’s line of birth is from Jottenheim, he was raised a son of Odin.”

“He allowed a vicious alien army to come to Earth in an attempt to destroy New York and more,” said Clint with a look. “Nobody has much sympathy for the devil.”

“That still doesn’t mean Phil is bad, right?” said Darcy uncertainly. “I mean, bad parents don’t always make bad kids.”

She didn’t look entirely sure about what she was saying, even though they all knew it was perfectly true. Those in this room were revered as heroes but their mothers and fathers were not all saints, not even close in some cases. By the same token, not every criminal or psycho was borne of evil. There were a great many factors to consider, still, nobody was at all enamoured with the idea that the baby they had come to care so much for in just a couple of days was the son of a being that had tried to destroy them all.

“What about his mother?” asked Pepper in the awkward silence that followed, watching as Darcy held on to the baby more tightly than before, defensive on the child’s behalf, no doubt. “You said she was human. Can we track down her identity?”

“That’s easier said than done,” Tony told her. “Even with the resources we have, there aren’t many factors to narrow down the search.”

“Actually, there might be,” considered Clint, looking to Thor who seemed so completely hypnotised by the son of his adopted brother right now. “Thor, you told me once that Loki had come to Earth before the Battle of New York. When we had you captured in New Mexico...”

“Wouldn’t that just be one of his illusions?” Nathasha questioned. “Astral projection?”

“No, on that occasion he was very much here,” said Thor definitely, “Of all people, I am able to tell. Loki has many back doors between the worlds, those that do not require the Bifrost or a portal the like of which brought him more recently,” he explained. “He did come to New Mexico, however briefly.”

“Might focus the search,” said Tony, looking thoughtfully at Bruce.

No-one was entirely certain how they were going to access the DNA of all the women in New Mexico, perhaps they couldn’t, but there were other ways. Narrowing down the search via women who had recently given birth, which ought to be an easy thing to check via hospitals and doctors records, maybe it wouldn’t be too hard to track the mother down.

“Okay,” Pepper nodded as she thought it over. “We need a plan. Those that are good with computers ought to be on research duty, the rest will be on baby-sitting,” she said, looking to the others for any complaints or comments.

"I’m not so good with technology,” Steve shook his head. “But I’ll help however I can with the baby.”

“Me and the good doctor can do most of the researching,” said Tony. “If Pepper wants to help?”

“Of course” she agreed easily. “Darcy, are you...?”

“I want to keep a hold on him for a while,” she said of the baby in her arms, leaning over to kiss the top of his head as he slept on, oblivious to what was going on all around him, to the drama he was causing with his very existence right now.

More than one person wondered if she might be better employed helping with research, after all, she was pretty swift on the computer, but she had been closer than anyone to the child and nobody was about to tell her she couldn’t do as she wanted.

“Where do you want us?” asked Natasha, referring to herself and Clint, and perhaps even to Thor who was silent and thoughtful still.

“I’m actually wondering if we need people out in the real world,” said Tony thoughtfully. “I mean, technology is going to help, but how about soldiers in the field?”

“The more points of attack, the more successful the mission as a rule,” Steve agreed. “If you believe this woman was in New Mexico and met Loki there, maybe somebody should be looking into that the old fashioned way?”

“But she was in New York two days ago,” Clint considered. 

“Maybe we would be better used in both places,” said Steve, getting up. “Thor and I could take one place, Barton and Romanoff the other. Question possible witnesses of the original liaison, and the dropping off of the baby at Stark’s door.”

“Solid plan, Captain,” Tony smiled, almost proud of his team-mate for the idea. “Just one addendum, our agent friends here can both fly planes. The demi-god knows his way around New Mexico, and your star spangled self is the hero of the hour in the big apple, so...”

“Steve and Nat take the New York point of attack, and Clint flies Thor down to New Mexico to look for clues there,” Pepper concluded, following her boyfriend's logic almost too well. “That’s fine, but it leaves Darcy literally holding the baby the entire time,” she said, looking to the intern with concern.

“I can handle it,” she said, almost defensively.

All eyes drifted from her and the baby then as everybody split up to cover their own missions, all but Bruce that was. They had been on shift together with the baby just twice, but eight hours of being trapped more-or-less alone together had been enough. He and Darcy were closer now than they had been two days ago, and though Dr Banner had his reservations about getting as close as she seemed to want to be, he knew he liked her, and he knew for sure how much she cared for baby Phil already. She didn’t want to hear he might be part evil, part of an alien that tried to destroy the world, or at least scare its people into kneeling before him. Loki’s son was not be envied and probably shouldn’t be loved as he was, and yet it couldn’t be helped. The baby was an innocent in all of this, little Phil, who’s namesake had died at his father’s hand. The irony was hysterically painful to think about.

“If you need anything,” said Bruce as he moved to leave the room himself, the last to go save for Darcy herself. “Just call, okay?”

“Thanks,” she nodded, painting on a smile that barely made it to her eyes. “I’m fine,” she assured him.

He wished it were easier to believe her right now. She wished it was easier to tell a convincing lie about how she really felt. This situation just got a whole lot more complicated, and Darcy didn’t like that one little bit.

_New York Investigation - Steve & Natasha_

“Stark, this is Romanoff,” said Natasha, pushing the comm device properly into her ear. “The fifth courier company was another bust. They’ve delivered to Stark Tower before, but nothing in the last month,” she confirmed.

“Understood, Agent,” he replied sharply. “Keep working down that list.”

“Roger that, Stark,” said Steve as he walked alongside Natasha down the busy New York street.

Out of his red, white, and blue he was less conspicuous but Captain America’s alter-ego still wasn’t keen on being spotted and identified. There always seemed to be someone on the look out, trying to spot a member of the famous Avengers team. Steve wasn’t much for the spotlight these days, it made Natasha wonder.

“I’m surprised you didn’t opt for the New Mexico mission,” she smirked slightly. “Might’ve been easier to hide there.”

“This is the task I was assigned, I have no problem with it,” he told her, shaking his head. “You trying to get rid of me, Agent Romanoff?”

“Not at all,” she assured him, checking the device in her hand that was tracking the next location by GPS and providing directions. “Honestly, I’m happier to have you here than Thor. He tends to attract more of a crowd with his... manner.”

She worded it just so, but Steve knew what she meant. As much as they were all recognisable out of costume, Thor did still walk like a hero and speak like the alien he was. That would draw more attention than a man like Steve Rogers, who for all intents and purposes was human.

“Honestly? I just feel the need to be doing something to help,” he sighed then, as they rounded the next corner. “That child is innocent in all this, no matter who his parents might be. I only hope we can find the mother and... well, offer her assistance so she can raise her son herself.”

“Even if she’s willing to try, she’s going to need help, and protection. Possibly from Loki if he ever discovers his paternity, possibly from the child too, as he grows.”

The look on his face proved that Steve didn’t want to think about that, and honestly, neither did Nat. That sweet little baby she had held in her arms, that in spite of all her training and the hardness of her character, had caused her to feel something akin to love again. Who couldn’t want to love an innocent child that gave nothing but smiles and hugs to those that did their best by him? She was only glad that so far there had been no talk of locking baby Phil away or worse.

“Is this the next place on the list?” asked Steve, looking up at the building they just reached.

“Apparently so,” Nat nodded once.

It was a much smaller operation than the first, with an unsavoury looking guy behind a counter, paying more mind to a magazine in his hands than any work at all. Nat thought this was the last guy she would trust with a package that contained a baby, but then that was probably the reason why this was just the place.

“I get the impression he’s not going to respond well to authority,” said Steve thoughtfully, looking sideways at Natasha.

She had her leather jacket open and the top two buttons of her shirt too before he could blink, putting a little something in her walk as she stepped in front of him towards the door.

“You think you can get the job done while I play diversion, Captain?” she asked, a smirk on her lips and one eyebrow raised.

“Yes, ma’am,” he nodded once, keeping his eyes locked on hers for fear of where else they might wander if he didn’t concentrate.

Nat led on into the store with Steve right behind her. Somehow they both had a feeling they had found just the place they were looking for.

_Stark Tower Research Team - Tony, Pepper, and Bruce_

They had set themselves up quite quickly to work as one unit. Each of their computer screens were visible by all on one large holographic projection above the desk at which Tony, Pepper, and Bruce hammered away on the keyboards to see what they could find with regards to the origin of baby Phil’s mother. All three also wore an earpiece, a comms device that allowed them to keep up with what was going on out in the field. After receiving word from Romanoff that the fifth out of thirteen couriers was a bust, Tony moved his copy of the list off the screen and went back to hacking satellites and cameras that might be able to give them anymore information on who dropped off the package two days ago.

Pepper was concentrating on New Mexico and was in regular contact with Clint and Thor. The jet got to its destination with relative ease and she had sent them a list of potential locations to check out. The area surrounding the spot where Mjolnir had originally been found was mostly desert for the first few miles, just a biker bar here and there on the way to the nearest small town. It was no problem for the agent and the Asgardian to go and ask questions even of the toughest looking men, for they knew they had nothing to fear. The world had seen what Thor could do in a fight, and even if they had missed it somehow, he was not against showing them his strength when challenged. Thankfully so far most people had been amiable enough, though few had any details to give. Pepper continued to search the surrounding area for any information she could find.

Next to her, Bruce was mostly running searches and checks that he had to wait for the results on. That wasn’t altogether a good thing as it allowed his mind to wander too much.

For Darcy’s safety as much as anything, the security cameras in Phil’s room were switched on and the feed displayed on a monitor in the room where Tony, Pepper, and Bruce were working. No matter how hard he tried to keep from doing so, Dr Banner couldn’t seem to help letting his eyes wander to that screen on a fairly regular basis.

The poor child, who knew nothing of his frightening origins, and the young woman so unafraid of anything apparently, just determined to do right by the baby she had quite literally come across by accident. Darcy Lewis really was quite a marvel. Even after everything they had learnt about baby Phil, that he was Loki’s child, still she treated him with such care and attention, perhaps even love. It was amazing to see.

The computer pinged, alerting Banner to another search completed. He looked back to his screen fast and tapped away at the shortlist before him. His area right now was doctors and hospitals, looking for any records of women admitted and babies born. The hacking skills he had learnt since hanging around with Tony served him well, and he was finding the lists they needed, but narrowing them down was still tough. It was kind of a game of chance, not knowing whether the team on the streets of New York or those in New Mexico would stumble onto a lead first, or even if one of them here at Stark Tower might make a break-through before too much longer.

“Okay guys, keep on going, just keep us informed,” said Pepper into her comms, before hitting the mute and turning to Tony. “Do we even have a plan for when we find this woman?” she asked him.

“Sure, bring her here,” he shrugged as if it were obvious and no problem at all.

“Tony, you can’t just assume she’ll want to come here,” Pepper rolled her eyes. “She abandoned her baby, maybe she doesn’t want to see him again, maybe she’s as dangerous as the man she slept with, you ever think of that?”

“Then, if that is the case, what better place for her to be than here?” he countered. “If she’s so dangerous, here we have all kinds of people and resources with the ability to keep her in check,” he reminded his girlfriend. “Besides, if she didn’t care about the kid she wouldn’t have brought him here for protection, she would’ve... I don’t know, left him on the sidewalk or under a bush in the park,” he shook his head. “No, she brought him here, to the heroes of the Battle of New York. She cares for her kid, she just didn’t know how to take care of him.”

“I’m gonna take a break,” said Bruce all out of blue.

“Oh, okay, man,” said Tony, waving pointlessly at Bruce’s back as he disappeared out of the door, glasses in hand.

Pepper frowned a little at the sudden exit of her colleague and then spared a glance at the camera feed from the baby’s room. Little Phil had been beyond tired more than an hour ago and was now screaming his lungs out in Darcy’s arms. Poor baby was probably picking up on all the tension and upset. Bruce had to have seen Darcy struggling and gone to help. He had his eyes on the monitor more often than on his work, Pepper had noticed that, even as she tried her best to concentrate on her own research.

It didn’t really matter too much that Bruce was taking a break. Until they got some clues from the teams outside the tower, it was unlikely the lists from the doctors registers and hospitals would really help. Pepper turned back to her screen and continued tapping away at the keyboard, flipping the switch that would turn off the feed to the cameras in Phil’s room for now. Something told her neither she nor Tony needed to be watching for the next little while, and Darcy and Bruce certainly didn’t need an audience.

“Barton to Potts, I think we have something,” said Clint’s voice in her ear then.

“Potts here, Barton. What do you have?”

_New Mexico investigation - Thor & Clint_

Thor and Clint had been searching the area surrounding Mjolnir’s original landing site for hours now. Few people were willing to talk to them right off the bat but a little gentle persuasion seemed to get them the information they were looking for. The first couple of biker bars sent them on wild goose chases, but this latest one seemed to be bearing fruit. Though the gang themselves were unwilling to talk, even when pressed, claiming to know nothing about nothing (a fact Clint almost believed of the dopes), they were followed back out into the heat of the desert by a mousy looking blonde they hadn’t even noticed before.

“Hello there,” said Thor politely when he spotted her hovering by the back door of the bar. “May we be of assistance?”

“I ain’t lookin’ for no help,” she said in a distinctly Southern accent. “Anybody knew I was out here talkin’ to you, I... It ain’t worth it.”

With that she shook her head and turned to go but Clint rushed to stop her. Knowing that laying hands on a woman like her was no good and liable to scare her into screaming, he simply put his arm out in front of her, blocking the door.

“Please,” he urged her. “We don’t want to make trouble, we’re the good guys,” he promised.

“I know it,” the mystery woman nodded her head as she turned and looked at him, a pretty young thing who had seen too many hardships, Clint was sure on that. “Recognise the two of you from the TV,” she smiled slightly. “Held off them aliens and saved New York, didn’t ya?”

“That was us, and our brothers and sister in arms,” Thor confirmed, striding over to join them. “We mean no harm to you, or to the woman we seek.”

“She would’ve been with a guy, English-type accent,” Clint explained, at which the supposed waitress squirmed. “We don’t want to hurt her, we think she needs help.” 

“I don’t know if she needs help now, but I thought she did the night she done come into the place, at least at first,” she explained, keeping her voice low as she moved further away from the building.

The window was open, they might yet be heard. Clint well understood her fear when she continued to speak quickly about what had happened.

“I don’t know who she was exactly. She was tall and pretty looking, my age maybe, or a little older. She looked awful sad and she just kept on ordering shots, ‘ceptin’ she didn’t seem like the type to drink that way on a normal day,” she explained awkwardly. “Weren’t my place to say nothin’, but then she got so wobbly and... well, some of the guys in this place is handsy at the best of times.”

“She was taken advantage of?” asked Thor too seriously.

“I don’t know for sure,” the mystery girl shook her head. “Not by the folks that started tryin’ something, that’s for sure. This man, he got up from the corner and came over into the light. He was awful handsome and all spiffied up. Not the type we normally get around these parts. Anyway, he made fast work o’ sending them pigs on their way, saving the girl like some kind o’ hero.”

“Loki?” said Thor, looking to Clint for his opinion. “He is quite adept at persuasion of all kinds, and prone to flamboyancy in his disguises.”

“I couldn’t say what his name was for sure,” said the woman, looking back towards the bar as laughter sounded, followed by a smashing of glass. “He was with her though. I heard him call her Mary-Kate and they was gettin’ awful familiar when I come by later to collect up the glasses for washin’,” she said fast edging towards the door that was now clear for her to use. “I can’t help you anymore. You oughta get gone,” she added before disappearing into the building again.

Thor and Clint shared a look, the latter tapping his comms and calling through to Pepper. Finally, it seemed like they had a lead.

_9th Shift - Darcy ( & Bruce)_

“Please, Phil. C’mon, kid, this isn’t helping,” Darcy was telling the baby as she rocked him against her chest, rubbing his back and trying to calm him down. 

It wasn’t easy when she had tears streaming down her own cheeks too. Her mind started racing with what might yet happen to the little one that she had bonded with so fast. Little Phil liked the whole team and was not against any of them taking care of him, but with all of them present it was Darcy he reached for. Maybe it was because she found him in the first place, or maybe just some great cosmic coincidence that he chose to like her. That was fine until they found out he was a son of Loki. That meant half his DNA came from a psychotic jackass, born of an alien nation, and hell-bent on ruling the world. With the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. both pledged to protect the planet from every possible threat, particularly the alien kind, Darcy dreaded to think what that ultimately meant for baby Phil, and that was before she even considered what Loki might do if he found out he had a child in the world. Plus there were other threats to consider, those who would want to experiment on the child or hold him hostage, maybe just kill him so he couldn’t grow up to be any kind of evil. It broke Darcy’s heart to think about it, hence the tears and worry that really weren’t helping right now. Kids picked up on things and Phil had gone from a happy, smiling infant to a grumpy little bundle since the meeting in which everybody’s mood shifted. Darcy wanted to be a calming influence, but knew she was failing miserably.

“Hey,” said a voice, and Darcy turned fast to see Bruce stood nervously by the bedroom door.

“Hi,” she replied, just loud enough to be heard over the din Phil continued to make.

“Er, you want me to try?” he offered to take the baby and in desperation Darcy handed him over.

She felt pretty useless and a little wrong in foisting an uncontrollably sad and angry child on a man that had enough trouble controlling his own negative emotions. Still, she was never afraid of Bruce Banner, and she took it as a positive sign that little Phil wasn’t either. Maybe it was the epic calmness the good doctor always had to employ in himself that managed to get Phil to eventually quit his crying. Darcy watched in wonder and awe as the kid seemed to give up in fighting sleep, his tightly balled fists uncurling, the bright red of his cheeks subsiding to their usual pale pink as he leant on Bruce’s chest and let sleep claim him at last.

“Sssh,” he urged him, rubbing his back when Phil murmured and wriggled a little. “It’s okay, it’s okay. We’re not letting anything happen to you,” he promised, though he was looking more at Darcy than at the baby now.

“That’s kind of incredible,” she smiled a watery smile, wiping her cheeks dry with the backs of her hands. “And not just the calming down of the kid thing. Your innate optimism too. That’s new.”

“It’s not optimism, Darcy, it’s the truth,” he assured her, walking by her to the crib and gently placing Phil inside.

He whimpered a little but just for a moment, soon settling down with his thumb in his mouth and sleeping on.

“You can’t know what’s gonna happen now,” she shook her head. “This team is owned by S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury put it together. I’ve seen how they react to aliens and its not usually good.”

“This baby is at least half human,” Bruce noted, eyes fixed on the slumbering child in the crib.

Darcy wandered over, standing close beside him to observe the same view of a sleeping little Phil.

“I don’t know how much that’ll matter to them,” she sighed. “I mean, it doesn’t matter to me. He’s still the same person he was yesterday, just because he might be half giant or monster or whatever the hell Loki is supposed to be, he’s still him, he could still be a good man.”

Bruce looked sideways at Darcy and caught her staring back at him. This wasn’t all about the baby and what kind of person he was or would be in the future. Though he was of natural human origin, Bruce himself was at least half monster these days. The Other Guy was a part of him, a big green part that he couldn’t always control. It was hard to think of himself as anything but a freak and a danger. Somehow Darcy only saw the man he had been before, the good person who only wanted to help the world. She saw that good in Phil too.

“You’re an amazing woman, Darcy Lewis,” he told her definitely, though it was clear from the way he glanced away fast that he hadn’t meant those words to be spoken aloud.

She smirked at his shyness and at the compliment that had come so unexpectedly.

“Wow, a compliment from the great Dr Banner?” she teased, bumping her shoulder against his own. “I’m overwhelmed.”

The moment turned serious again within a few seconds as little Phil shifted in his sleep and drew the attention of both those stood watching over him.

“I promise you, both of you,” said Bruce quietly, “nothing awful is going to happen to him,” he swore. “I won’t let it,” he told Darcy as he met her eyes.

“I know,” she nodded her agreement. “Me either.”


	6. Chapter 6

 

Cross-referencing the name Mary-Kate with the lists Bruce had pulled up from hospitals and doctors led to a short-list of just two names in New York and one in New Mexico. The last courier Steve and Nat had hit proved useful enough, since their records showed a fairly small but quite weighty package had been delivered to Stark Tower on the date in question. The senders details were vague at best. Conveniently, a Miss Smith had paid cash and given a return address that proved to be not a home but a long ago shut-down clothing store on the other side of town. Steve and Nat were about to be re-routed to one of the Mary-Kate addresses in the city when Tony suddenly halted in his instructions.

“Well, we found our girl,” he chuckled slightly. “The address Mary-Kate Vincent gave the hospital is the same one you’re standing outside of, guys.” 

“Great,” Agent Romanoff grumbled. “Almost guaranteed she faked her Social Security number too.”

“Looks that way, Widow,” Tony confirmed in her ear. “So far so dead-endy, huh?”

“Not necessarily,” said Clint having heard everything via the comms which were open amongst all parties right now. “The address down here for Mary-Kate Anderson seems legit,” he confirmed, even as he and Thor combed through the woman’s belongings.

They had come in through the back door, picking the lock with one of Barton’s fancier arrows when nobody answered their knocking. There was definitely nobody here, but maybe some kind of clue as to who had been or where she had gone to next.

“How do we know she is one and the same that we are looking for?” asked his partner. “The mother of Loki’s child? Their names are different.”

“It’s called an alias, man,” explained Tony in his ear. “This woman was trying to hide herself, probably more so in New York than anywhere. So, she switched out last names, maybe to her maiden name, the name of a celebrity, whatever worked for her that she could remember and stick to.”

“I don’t think she’s been here for a while,” said Clint, looking out of the front window at a mail box stuffed with too many letters.

“She didn’t go back home after dropping off baby Phil,” said Pepper thoughtfully. “I’m guessing she has to be somewhere in New York still, maybe wondering if she made the wrong decision?”

“Or she hopped on a plane to the other side of the world,” sighed Tony, pinching the bridge of his nose as a headache started to form behind his eyes. “This is getting crazy.”

“What about the other address you have for New York?” asked Steve then. “Maybe its another fake last name? Maybe that’s really her.”

“If I may, sir,” said J.A.R.V.I.S. suddenly. “I do believe that Captain Rogers may be correct. Look at the pattern forming.”

The screen shifted and Tony watched alongside Pepper as J.A.R.V.I.S. listed the last names of all the Mary-Kates in order with the first letter of each highlighted.

“Anderson, Vincent, Eastman - A, V, E,” Pepper smiled. “It could be a coincidence, but I think she’s trying to spell out Avengers.”

“Maybe she thought that was the best way to keep track of her identities,” said Nat thoughtfully. “I’ve certainly heard worse.”

“Well then, it’s looking like Mary-Kate Eastman is our girl - good work, J.A.R.V.I.S.,” said Tony, sending the address straight to Romanoff and Rogers to check out.

“We’re on our way,” Steve confirmed as they hurried across town one more time.

* * *

Bruce wandered through from Phil’s bedroom to find Darcy laid out on the couch fast asleep. He wasn’t at all surprised she was tired, the last few days had been pretty crazy and she had put in all the hours she could helping to look after the baby. Just now Bruce thought he heard him and went through to check, but Phil was fine, presumably just fidgeting in his sleep. Bruce had been gone from the room all of a minute and Darcy was dead to the world. She looked so peaceful, so beautiful, lying there, he couldn’t help but smile as he grabbed a spare blanket and carefully covered her with it.

Darcy was missing her caffeine, Bruce was sure. She liked her coffee, no doubt, and there had been no time for a run to Starbucks or similar. Bruce knew he should probably stay here and watch over the two of them or moreover that he should go back to Tony and Pepper and help with research, though he wasn’t exactly a lot of use before. Standing in the middle of the room, he ended up turning a full circle as he considered his options. His eyes then went towards the ceiling and he spoke in a volume not much louder than a whisper.

“J.A.R.V.I.S.?” 

“Yes, Dr Banner. May I be of assistance?” he replied smoothly, soft enough that neither Darcy nor Phil stirred at all.

“Do you know if I’m needed for research right now?” he checked with the A.I.

“They all seem to be coping fairly well in your absence, Doctor,” JARVIS told him politely. “If you would rather be elsewhere, I can send your apologies should there be another formal meeting.”

“That’d be great, thanks,” said Bruce with a smile. “Could you also do me one more favour and keep an eye on these two while I’m gone?” he asked, looking at Darcy with a smile he couldn’t help and then through the bedroom door to Phil’s crib.

“Certainly, sir,” J.A.R.V.I.S. agreed easily.

With that settled, Bruce felt better about heading out to fetch coffee and maybe doughnuts for Darcy. She would appreciate that, he knew, maybe too much now that he thought about it, but that wouldn’t stop him. She was such a good person, he felt the need to help take care of her, as she had been taking care of the baby. Being protective wasn’t a completely new emotion to Bruce, but it had been a while since anybody had wanted him to get close enough to do that, since he would allow himself the chance. Darcy was so different to anyone he ever met before. He was pretty sure he had hadn’t smiled as much as he had the past few days in quite a long time.

The elevator pinged and the doors opened into the lobby. Bruce checked he had his wallet and enough cash for a coffee run, thinking perhaps he should get enough for everybody instead of just himself and Darcy. He was half way to the front door, eyes focused on dollar bills, when suddenly he collided with a woman that came bolting in, all red hair and flailing arms.

“I’m sorry, but you have to help me!” she wailed, even as security guards came over to drag her away. “Please, I made a mistake. I’ve done something terrible, I want to make it right please! Help me!” she yelled to Bruce as the guards tried to drag her out.

“Wait, stop!” he demanded of the security guys who looked at each other over the screaming woman’s head, unsure if they were supposed to take instruction from Dr Banner or not.

“Please, I didn’t mean any harm, I don’t want to hurt anybody,” the woman cried, tears pouring down her cheeks. “I just want to see my baby!”

* * *

It was decided that it might be too much for the hysterical mother of baby Phil to meet with the whole Avengers team at once. Pepper elected to be the one to take point, being both a fellow female and a little less potentially scary than some of the actual heroes. Whilst the team reformed in the conference room, watching the meeting between Mary-Kate and Pepper unfold via video-feed, Darcy remained with the baby. She had a monitor to watch too, though she could barely stand to see the woman who abandoned her child. Mary-Kate had her reasons, especially if she realised how bad the father of said child really was. That was unknown until she started talking. Mary-Kate needed to stop sobbing before she could give an explanation.

“It’s okay,” said Pepper kindly, handing over another wad of tissue. “Take your time.”

“I just... I don’t want you to think I’m this horrible person,” she cried. “I love my baby, I do, I was just so scared.”

“Well, I can’t speak from experience, but I’m sure a lot of mother’s feel out of their depth sometimes, especially in the beginning,” said Pepper, trying to be sympathetic, trying to find out what Mary-Kate knew of the baby’s father before she put her foot in it.

“It’s not just that,” she poor woman sniffled, blowing her nose hard. “Miss Potts, I... I made a mistake. I wouldn’t ever call my son a mistake, it’s not his fault, but going with his father... I’m not that kind of person,” she laughed bitterly. “Really, I just, I had a really bad break up. I was down in New Mexico to meet his family and he just abandoned me there. That same day I found out I lost my job. So I went to a bar, I started drinking. I’m usually a couple of glasses of wine kind of girl but I was just so upset and... I hadn’t done shots since I was in college,” she shook her head, putting a hand to her forehead as she recalled her behaviour with disgust. “Some guys started hitting on me, they didn’t take no for an answer. I was afraid, but then this other man stepped in. He seemed so nice, so sweet.”

“Do you know who he was? A name maybe?” asked Pepper shakily, trying to keep any hint of suggestion out of her voice and looks.

Mary-Kate looked across at her through red-rimmed eyes and smiled a weak and watery smile.

“I think we both know that already,” she admitted. “I didn’t know what he was then, that he was an alien of all things! A foreigner, sure, he sounded British to me, but I had no idea what I was getting into,” she explained. “You've got to believe me.”

“I do,” she sympathised, putting a hand on Mary-Kate’s arm. “Loki is... he has great powers of persuasion.”

“I’m not sure I took much persuading, drunk as I was,” she admitted, embarrassed to have to make such an admission. “When I woke up in the morning I was alone in my hotel room, with a hangover and a barrel load of shame and regret. I had no idea I also had a baby on the way.”

Pepper didn’t know what to say, what comfort she could possibly give this woman. It still seemed strange that Loki would even want to come to Earth to sleep with a woman here. If his plan was to impregnate someone, surely he would have searched for Mary-Kate on his return. Thor had said he presumed it was mere curiosity that made Loki do what he did. He probably just wanted to see what the fuss was about when it came to Midgard and its people. He always was curious, amongst so many worse traits.

“After what happened here, when I realised it was caused by the same guy that I... by my baby’s father, I was so scared,” Mary-Kate admitted, tears filling her eyes one more time. “I started thinking he would be better off with you, in case he was different, in case somebody realised who or what he was and came after him, but it’s been three days and all I do is cry. I need to be with my son.”

“Of course you do,” Pepper sympathised. “And I’m happy to take you to him right now, but if I could ask, does he have a name?” she checked, suddenly realising that he probably did have a real name.

“Yeah,” she smiled. “I named him for my uncle who we lost a while back. I called him Phil.”

* * *

Darcy handed baby Phil to his natural mother and wondered at the pull in her heart. This woman abandoned him, she shouldn’t be allowed to just walk back in and act like everything was fine. At the same time, Darcy knew it was better for baby Phil to be with his real family. If Mary-Kate was all there was, then that was who he needed. She certainly did seem sorry for what she’d done. She just freaked out when she realised she had a child born of an evil father. Darcy could understand that. When she first met Thor, she tased him into submission... after hitting him with a car. All in all, she had pretty much panicked her ass off until somebody explained what was happening and she saw that there was nothing to be afraid of where her buddy the Asgardian hero was concerned. Mary-Kate couldn’t get that kind of comfort. Loki really was a very bad guy and she slept with him. The very thought of that made Darcy shudder, she couldn’t imagine how weird it must be for the woman in front of her.

“I’ll just...” she muttered, hiking her thumb towards the exit and walking out.

It wasn’t much of a surprise to find somebody on guard outside the door, but she hadn’t really expected it to be Bruce. 

“Hey,” she smiled weakly when she saw him.

“Hi. Are you okay?” he checked.

She shook her head, ran a hand back through her hair.

“I don’t know,” she admitted then. “I mean, baby has his Mommy back, that should be a happy ending, but it bothers me,” she sighed, looking back towards the closed door to what had been Phil’s room such a short while.

“Too many unknown variables,” Bruce nodded in understanding. “We don’t know if we can trust her, she might not be all she seems, especially if her uncle Phil really was Agent Coulson. We don’t know how the baby will turn out as he grows up, and if Loki ever finds out he’s a father...”

“Scary,” agreed Darcy, trying to hold back a yawn and failing miserably as she let her back lean against the wall heavily.

“You should go get some more sleep,” said Bruce. “I was actually on my way out to get you coffee when all this happened, but now... well, I think the rest would do you more good.”

Darcy smiled a real genuine, if not sleepy smile across at the good doctor. He looked embarrassed that he had even appeared to care about her or tried to do something kind. If nothing else came out of this whole baby debacle, it had certainly helped the two of them connect a little more. Darcy was never going to be sorry about that.

“Thanks, but I couldn’t sleep,” she admitted, shaking off the sweet moment in favour of the more serious for now. “I need to know what’s going to happen with him.”

She looked back at the door to Phil’s room, wondering what was occurring with mother and child. She wasn’t trying to escape or doing any harm. If she tried, J.A.R.V.I.S. would let them know and all hell would break loose. Still, Darcy wondered what would happen yet. If Mary-Kate wanted to take Phil away, there was nothing they could do to stop her.

“They’re probably going to end up staying here,” said Bruce, allaying at least some of Darcy's fears. “Tony and Pepper have offered Mary-Kate an apartment within the tower, like we all have,” he explained. “She wanted protection for her baby, we can still offer that, only we would be protecting the both of them,” he shrugged.

“That’s cool,” Darcy nodded, finding a genuine smile from knowing at least that Phil was going to be around, that she might get a chance to help out still. “So, with that already decided...” she said, moving over to sidle up next to Bruce. “You said something about buying me coffee?” she smirked a little, resting her chin on his shoulder as she peered up at him.

“Darcy, I wasn’t... it wasn’t an invitation exactly,” he told her definitely, swallowing hard. “I mean, I was trying to help, but I wasn’t asking you out or anything.”

“Sure you were,” she rolled her eyes, like he just said the most stupid thing ever. “Now c’mon, caffeine is needed, before this woman gets cranky.”

She had a hold of his sleeve when she started walking away and Bruce let the momentum carry him off behind her. Laughter escaped his throat the like of which was rarely ever heard. So much for the unknown variables of baby Phil, his mother, and Loki. Bruce wasn’t sure he would ever be able to keep up with Darcy Lewis, but honestly, in this moment, he was more than a little tempted to try.

The End


End file.
